This is the first I've heard of 'abundance theory', but from the get-go it sounds like more pussyfooting. I'd love for the obscenely wealthy to finally get hearts and share their wealth in ways that actually benefited millions of people who need help. I don't hold my breath. They could have done it by now if they'd wanted to.
I'm an old-fashioned liberal in the JFK, West Wing sense, which some would say is way center of left, but my calls to the Democrats--MY Democrats, I've been a blue collar party member since I was born--are simple: support labor unequivocally, raise the minimum wage significantly, get rid of SS caps, work toward universal health care and don't stop until you get there, lower prescription drug prices, save public education, save our public lands, keep our air and water pure, keep lawlessness out of our courts, license guns like cars--at the very least, regulate when necessary, and only consider people for office and public sector jobs who understand the 'public' part and will be true to their oaths.
None of that is as hard as watching our entire society go up in flames. Honesty, integrity, honor, loyalty, and hearts big enough to see that real people are being harmed, real institutions are being damaged, real democracy is at stake--we need to choose wisely. Eyes on the prize.
This reminds me how much the Democrats have moved right over the last decade. All the things you mentioned were once standard liberalism. But now you only hear them from the 'left' wing of the party. I'd also add campaign finance. Obama was strong against Citizens United. Now many Democrats support it!
Yup. And now it's time to move back. We can only do it if we believe in what we're doing. The Democrats have the worst inferiority complexes in the world, brought on by trying but never succeeding at getting out of the 'underdog' status, even when they've won. It's our job to bring us back.
It's simple. Just do the right thing. Stop being distracted. We know what we have to do, and if our current leadership doesn't, we find new ones. They're out there. We're not alone in this.
Actually, the Dem party has been chasing steadily Republican voters since they lost to Reagan. They don't give a fig about the Democrats of that time and they'd just as soon have them drop dead then go after their votes. I guess they take them for granted since the system is rigged against a Party getting on the ticket that is real Democracts can call home.
I didn't leave the party, the party left me (a lie then by Reagan). This is more true of Democractic Democracts of today.
So why is this totally reasonable approach to democratic governance being constantly slapped away as though it were some kind of radical anarchist revolution? Particularly when other democracies receive high scores for happier populations when they implement those policies as a baseline?
My sweet summer child, the US has never been a democracy. It's a "country" on stolen land. The "founders" we're genocidal, British Lords. They also owned Black people when they wrote the "Declaration of Independence." Independence for WEALTHY, WHITE MEN only. Not for women, not for POC, and not for poor, white people.
Dear me, how could I not know those things?? We've always been striving toward democracy, and that's a mighty goal. Don't knock it. The alternatives are wicked and deadly. We'd rather not go there.
You go ahead and bow out, full of grievance and dismissal, and I'll go on fighting for my country, flawed but worth keeping. Those are our choices.
You're a sheep. You want to be ruled over. I don't. Governments are bad, mmmkay. And you're saying the US is legitimate, it isn't. It's a British colonial settlement just like Israel.
This is not about the legitimately of this government. It's about more attacks on those useless non-wealthy people that need to be cut loose from any help from the rest of this society.
I agree with a lot of this. As for guns I want guns regulated like cars also. I want to be able to carry my gun in all 50 states like I can drive in all 50 states, I want no restrictions on ammo capacity like no fuel capacity restrictions on cars, and I want no restrictions on caliber like there is no restriction on horsepower.
I haven’t finished reading your piece yet, but I’m so simultaneously enraged and excited by it that I can’t resist the urge to make a preliminary point: any and all ordinary Americans of Good Will can determine whether a pundit, analyst or politician is being authentic or bullshitting simply by identifying whether they equivocate on the meaning of “woke” and/or “the Left.”
These Neoliberal bullshitters always try to act like the Sanders/AoC wing of the party is totally out of touch by being “too woke,” when the fact of the matter is, the material/economic policies advocated by Sanders/AoC are overwhelmingly popular. It’s true (sadly) that many Americans are not (yet) on board with certain important issues of what has been called “social liberalism,” but to treat this discrepancy in popular sentiment and avowed ideology as if it exhaustively captures the views of self-described Leftists is a flat-out lie.
I’m so fucking sick of Klein, Thompson, et. al. I confess that I’m beginning to find it difficult not to hate them with a similar passion to my contempt for the MAGAts. Sigh. I’m a work in progress.
Bernie and AOC are the two most popular elected politicians in the country. It's Washington group think that their ideas are unreasonable or unpopular.
This Abundance Movement makes me think it's the secular version of Prosperity Gospel, both, IMHO, looking for a slick way to cover the underlying, and baseless, claim that "them that have, deserve it, and them that don't, don't. Or maybe I'm missing something in making what might be a too fast conclusion?
Yes, that has always been one of the NeoLiberal talking points according to George Monbiot in his book on the ways the many NeoLiberal Think Tanks have converted the population and people of influence to their way.
In fact their are many ringing the warning bells about the "Abundance Movement". I just did a search with Ezra Klein and NeoLiberal as the two key words and got back many publications on the dangers of his and his cohorts selling of this movement... many.
[Over the past few years, a cohort of neoliberal pundits from Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson to Matt Yglesias and Eric Levitz have increasingly problematized the modern regulatory state. They frame the government’s many environmental and labor standards as an impediment to “abundance.” Multiple books advancing this argument are slated to be published in the first months of 2025, from Marc Dunkelman’s Why Nothing Works to Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson.
“Supply-side liberals” take aim at the procedures that environmental and labor laws require the federal and state governments to follow as they assess the impacts of new infrastructure projects. They decry the tools that the left has wielded since the mid-twentieth century to hold government accountable when it fails to adequately do so. They frame the “need for speed” in the urgent terms of the energy transition. But they have tended to back legislative concessions to the fossil fuel industry and other corporate interests in the name of greater expediency.]
In my opinion, the Abundance Movement (if coming from the ideology in the Abundance book) isn’t about protecting those with capital and reinforcing low-redistribution systems, it’s about encouraging supply of housing, infrastructure, medicine, and innovation (in the form of effective research funding). The idea is to remove limitations of supply/improve efficiency of production that’s artificially hamstrung in order to lower costs for things: houses in the private market or public investment in infrastructure and R&D (lower cost in that the average person’s taxes goes back to them in greater public utility).
Thanks for this information. My impression came from the vibes coming off the name. It has that same feeling that appeals to the well-off, or those wanting to be in the upper circles. My bad.
What are you even talking about? Democratic politicians are the exact people Klein is criticizing. They’re overly focused on spending and well intentioned regulations rather than efficient and effective outcomes. LA’s homeless housing debacle spending billions on nothing, CA’s HSR delayed forever with insane costs, blue cities and states driving out working class families by exploding the cost of housing with arcane zoning restrictions.
Every time I click on one of these anti-Abundance articles it’s clear none of you have bothered to actually address Klein’s critiques. You just call him mean names and claim that Democrats would sweep to glorious power if only they embraced fantastical policies that have lost at the ballot box time and time again.
Democratic politicians ARE the Abundance Movement. Klein might criticize CA high speed rail, but Gavin Newsom is championing the Abundance Agenda as the next big thing. Again, I am criticizing the Movement, not the book.
We all know what's wrong with the Democrats. They don't listen to their constituents. Get out of DC, go buy groceries like an average American, shop at Walmart or Target and ask questions. Then STFU AND LISTEN. REALLY LISTEN.
Not a town hall. Not a letter writing campaign. An actual week or two on the streets of your district.
We need professors, teachers, union members (auto, service industry, anything), scientists, people who needed SNAP and Medicaid, workers workers workers LABOR, to run for office. DNC pays for it. They pissed away $1 billion war chest and lost to a candidate that proved his inability to be president from 2017-2021. Consider this the “Robin Hood” strategy, taking from the rich to give to the poor. Money doesn’t take, it swears.
My congressional district, Nevada District 2, Congressman Mark E. Amodei (the worst kind of lap dog) ran last year with no Democratic opponent. There was an independent candidate. But NO DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE. Show up! Make noise. Raise a stink! SHOW THE FUCK UP!
There must be more than just my district where the incumbent is running unopposed. Take $150,000 and run a candidate. No flyers, no mailers, no advertising. $150k to get the message out on social media, on YouTube, in the local papers and on the local stations.
I’m so sick of this inability to have a message. It’s a malaise with Democrats. Entropy.
I come from a background where we marched, we knocked on doors, we did grassroots fundraising, we made coalitions, we canvassed. We didn’t rely on spin doctors, cable news networks, pundits, analysts, and polls. We relied on the sincerity and righteousness of our cause. We fought for justice.
MAGA and Trump call Democrats “the enemy.” START ACTING LIKE IT.
I reject the entire framing. There shouldn’t need to be a “choice” between, say, expediting permitting for new El tracks in Chicago and a robust social safety net. Or between next-Gen nuclear and a clean environment, for that matter. Maybe Dems should just be in favor of sh*t that makes sense and leave it at that?
I agree, and I think Klein would too. However, the real-life politicians claiming Abundance say we need to move to the right and get rid of those safety nets.
“Abundance say the opposite.” This is dead wrong. Getting rid of social safety nets? That is actually the complete opposite of what they say. Constantly. On literally every podcast and in just about every article. A person wouldbe hard-pressed to come up with a greater distortion of their actual positions. But I get it. Discourse of so much easier when you just lie about the people you disagree with
No, which is my point. I want Klein to clarify if he thinks the Abundance Movement, which IS dominated by voices trying to reduce social spending, should be the Democrats' national answer. Again, I'm not criticizing what Klein wrote in the book. I'm criticizing what came after it, and asking him to state what he thinks about it.
I’m sorry, but it sounds like a cult to me. I don’t want anything to do with it! I prefer the vision of Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. It’s the word “abundance.” Gives me the heebie jeebies. Don’t want anything to do with it.
I used to listen to Ezra Klein on Vox. Eventually I got tired of the verbosity. If Ezra can use ten multi syllable words to describe something that could otherwise be described in five short syllables, he will. His tone of voice is so soft it’s almost a somnambulant. Puts me right under. Listening to him is like watching a beehive. Lots of buzzing, but no honey.
I have listened to him many times. That was kind of the point to what I said! Puts me to sleep. I’m sure he’s a very nice fellow, but I can’t keep my attention on what he’s saying over the long haul. And my point had more to do with the idea of “abundance,” which had always had a negative connotation to me. I think because there’s a branch of evangelical Christianity that follows an “abundance” philosophy, which allows them to become very rich and ignore the poverty all around them. “Jesus doesn’t really hate the money changers in the temple; he wants everyone to share in the abundance of material goods,” which is not what Jesus’ own words say in the Bible. So talking about abundance has those echoes for me. It’s code for being selfish and that being okay.
I don't care if you dislike Klein. I do care if fighting Trump is not your priority.
Trump threatens to turn our country into a dictatorship. We need a big tent resistance, with the only membership rule being willingness to fight Trump.
One can't be a lifelong 'Centrist' Democract. The center has been moving steadily to the Right,v pegging nearly far right in these days. Possible to say life long 'Conservative' Democract.
I cannot stand Donald Trump. I wish he would die, right now. I don’t even dislike Klein. I just find him long-winded. But I have ADHD and listening to some people is difficult for me.
I appreciate this perspective. I have just started reading Abundance, after hearing a compelling talk with the authors and Michael Pollan on the Long Now podcast. That venue, by design, takes a longer view. It’s worth a listen.
“My theory is that Ezra Klein knows Abundance was never meant to be what it became.” I think this is an important point that is getting lost in the larger discussion. Why are we giving so much agency to the authors over how the Dems respond? The Democratic Party does not have an Ezra Klein problem. It has a zero unified vision problem. If they glom onto this idea and rebrand it because it is neatly packaged for them, merits aside, that just shows a general lack of creativity and leadership on the party’s part that they need to wait for a policy reporter to coin their platform for them. We know that the party is divided. No one is getting the job done of unifying -- AOC/Bernie or the center-lefties. And that has shot them in the foot. I don’t think it’s necessary, or even causal, to pin that on two reporters who have some decent ideas about getting the country unstuck. Maybe this shouldn’t be a partisan concept? That would be the dream. I think the book speaks to that possibility.
Also, I do not have the knowledge of union politics that you clearly do. But as a 30 year Coloradan, Polis is not a panacea governor. No one politician can be. Just as no one book can solve all the problems, no matter how compelling. Polis has done some good things, and some shifty things. That is disappointing about the unions. But I don’t think we can give the Abundance movement that much credit. It is conceptually new. Naming things retroactively seems unwise.
What I am interested in is whether the salient points in the book have legs, party bastardization aside. We need more housing now, we need flourishing cities and rural areas now, we need clean energy now. Our main problem is dickering over nuance in getting any of that done. Thanks for the thoughts.
Thanks for reading! I agree with what you say about Polis. He's certainly not Abundance-only. I used that example to point out that the Movement (mostly centrist, already-elected Democrats) has no interest in the 'left Abundance' Klein talks about in his book. So when he says that in interviews, he's talking about an imaginary option, not what Abundance has become.
It’s interesting to me how the “abundance” tribe and the “anti-abundance” tribe, when they fight, completely talk past each other. The Seder-Klein debate was a really good example of this. Each side seems to have came away from it thinking their guy so completely trounced the other. Those inclined to support Klein thought that Seder was completely non-rigorous, unable to deal in anything except generalities. Joe seemed to sum up the opposite position well, the idea that Klein’s points were sleight of hand to distract from the big questions.
People are talking about completely different things, and seem confused by this because each side wants to fight on the ground they want to fight on. There seems to be some general disbelief in the conversation that the other side genuinely cares about the things they say they care about.
I agree, but I think Klein was changing the conversation on purpose, for the reasons I stated. Seder would ask him a question about national-level politics, which is valid given the Abundance Movement, and Klein would change the conversation to a specific issue. It was disingenuous.
Total joke of an article. The origins of abundance politics lie not in elite hands, but in planning commission and city council meetings.
Detached from what actually matters in favor of upping points for your preferred team on an imaginary scorecard—without realizing that there is nothing in abundance politics that prevents its combination with anti-monopolism. In fact, the two are well-suited together and prominent abundance folks frequently call for their combination.
When you say Abundance, do you mean the movement or the book? I agree that the book could take an anti-monopolist flavor. But the Movement has shown no interest in doing that.
Abundance "the movement" precedes the book, but is named by it (for popular political purposes). And yes, many urbanists, solar developers, and popular movement builders that support them are anti-monopolists as well. Again, they have been before any attempt at popularly naming them was made.
In fact, the anti-monopoly forwarded by popular Democrats is weak. It pretends to be all encompassing, but it focuses almost completely on corporate concentration of power. If you are serious, you have to also consider small-p private, nonprofit, and public sector concentrations of power. Academic Neo-brandeisism is concerned with all of these things, but in political practice it has expressed itself to the incredibly limited view of corporate and oligarchical criticism. For example, there is an astonishing moment in Klein's recent interview with Zephyr Teachout where she answers that housing is probably so expensive to build because of corporate concentration--I am in the process right now of entering real estate development, and this is simply not the case. Housing construction remains a startingly local and small-business job. The high costs come primarily from building codes and arbitrary aesthetic and historically "moral" restrictions that cities place first on the developers that build a home, and then on the people and businesses that would occupy it.
So, where you may say abundance the movement fails to address the concerns of anti-monopoly, even if it may theoretically account for them, I feel just as well happy saying this of anti-monopoly about the concerns of abundance. I will extend this further to say that I do not believe anti-monopoly will be a winning strategy, and neither will abundance. They are similarly motivated theoretical framings interested in mostly distinct policy mechanics that motivate different groups of voters to address different concerns. Both are useful and necessary, but neither is on its own a popular political movement capable of electing a president, or more importantly, an efficacious Congress.
In the end, I have no issue with anti-monopoly, but I do take issue with the incessant blog-style pieces taking misinformed and disingenuous pot-shots at abundance. If you see no theoretical issue between the two, write that. What you have here will not help build any coalition, and it certainly does not help in restoring truth and decency to public discourse.
Cut the flow of dark money into politics and that alone will solve one third of the problems and corruption in government. Tax at 75% and remove subsidies (welfare) for corporations, agribusiness, churches and billionaires and we’ve solve another third of the problem in government. Lastly, reform the constitution to include the lessons we’ve learned in the past 250 years. This country will not be of the people, by the people and for the people until the people take it over and run it.
I really see no reason why the Bernie/AOC economic justice agenda and the Abundance agenda couldn't be combined into a robust platform that addresses a wide range of concerns and builds a broad coalition. The main reason it can't is due to the fact that the oligarchs are trying to use abundance as an alternative to economic justice instead of a supplement.
It also doesn't help that abundance is being interpreted as deregulation, rather than a holistic rethinking of how various regulations interplay in the market and how they could be streamlined without sacrificing their goals. I thought the book was clear that it was not proposing another "throw the baby out with the bathwater" approach to deregulation that we usually see.
If you pair abundance with universal health care, you can counter the whole "tax and spend liberal" characterization while still pushing for important new programs. I'm fully annoyed that the power brokers are turning this into a false dichotomy instead of a winning partnership.
You're hitting on another divide between how Klein talks, saying there's a 'left abundance,' and the Abundance Movement which is actively fighting the left. It's another reason I'd like him to clarify his thoughts on the larger project.
You're being disingenuous. What Klein is proposing won't lower rent and electricity to the point Americans are comfortable with. On energy, we need to remove the profit motive. Power lines are centrally planned by the government but run by private companies. They charge more to make a profit. Eliminating that will drastically lower costs.
On energy, environmental laws need to be redone so that any utility, public or private, can build the transmission lines needed to decarbonize. On energy, laws need to change so that a utility, public or private, has an easier time building more power plants.
On housing, rent is cheaper in Texas than it is in Washington. I would love to hear you explain how people are more motivated by profit in the Pacific Northwest than they are in Texas.
That white suburban mom that actually likes Liz Cheney does *not* want zoning reform. So who TF are they trying to attract? Get back the tech bros? Maybe, they are turning on Trump now. But most people, across demographics are done with billionaire rule, so who has better messaging?
You wrote that the left-of-center divide is between those inclined to capital and those inclined to labor. If that's true, then it's sure weird that when you look at the actual issues the left position is often closer to the preferences of the top-half than to the policies working class voters prefer.
For example, Joe is upset that Colorado Governor Jared Polis vetoed a bill that would have streamlined workplace unionization, because “unions are proven to help raise wages, and Polis is beholden to his anti-union corporate donors.” Maybe. Or, it could be that unions are a lot more popular among the left than they are among working class voters. Just 9.9% of U.S. workers belong to a labor union. Maybe Polis realizes that the Democratic Party has lost and must win back working voters, who don’t see shrinking labor unions as a big problem for the economy or their economic well-being. Nor do they place labor unions near the top of what’s most likely to help working people get ahead. https://www.progressivepolicy.org/campaign-for-working-america-a-ppi-yougov-survey-of-working-class-voters/https://www.thirdway.org/report/renewing-the-democratic-party
So few workers belong to unions because of corporate-controlled politicians like Polis. I'm hesitant to trust a source that calls itself 'radically pragmatic,' so let's use Gallup. According to them, labor unions are at a 70% approval rating. https://x.com/Gallup/status/1828793176754409957
Also, I'm a labor organizer, and unions are popular no matter the workers' political affiliation. I've certainly organized more rural Trump voters than urban progressives.
Thank you. I was given a ticket to his book tour - and was baffled by why anyone would take him seriously. Ezra - and all the upper class liberals who find him mesmerizing simply live in a self-imposed cocoon. They have to take great pains not to see or feel the suffering around them - much less take account of their
This is the first I've heard of 'abundance theory', but from the get-go it sounds like more pussyfooting. I'd love for the obscenely wealthy to finally get hearts and share their wealth in ways that actually benefited millions of people who need help. I don't hold my breath. They could have done it by now if they'd wanted to.
I'm an old-fashioned liberal in the JFK, West Wing sense, which some would say is way center of left, but my calls to the Democrats--MY Democrats, I've been a blue collar party member since I was born--are simple: support labor unequivocally, raise the minimum wage significantly, get rid of SS caps, work toward universal health care and don't stop until you get there, lower prescription drug prices, save public education, save our public lands, keep our air and water pure, keep lawlessness out of our courts, license guns like cars--at the very least, regulate when necessary, and only consider people for office and public sector jobs who understand the 'public' part and will be true to their oaths.
None of that is as hard as watching our entire society go up in flames. Honesty, integrity, honor, loyalty, and hearts big enough to see that real people are being harmed, real institutions are being damaged, real democracy is at stake--we need to choose wisely. Eyes on the prize.
This reminds me how much the Democrats have moved right over the last decade. All the things you mentioned were once standard liberalism. But now you only hear them from the 'left' wing of the party. I'd also add campaign finance. Obama was strong against Citizens United. Now many Democrats support it!
Yup. And now it's time to move back. We can only do it if we believe in what we're doing. The Democrats have the worst inferiority complexes in the world, brought on by trying but never succeeding at getting out of the 'underdog' status, even when they've won. It's our job to bring us back.
It's simple. Just do the right thing. Stop being distracted. We know what we have to do, and if our current leadership doesn't, we find new ones. They're out there. We're not alone in this.
Actually, the Dem party has been chasing steadily Republican voters since they lost to Reagan. They don't give a fig about the Democrats of that time and they'd just as soon have them drop dead then go after their votes. I guess they take them for granted since the system is rigged against a Party getting on the ticket that is real Democracts can call home.
I didn't leave the party, the party left me (a lie then by Reagan). This is more true of Democractic Democracts of today.
Wrong. How old are you, 12?
Amen to that!
So why is this totally reasonable approach to democratic governance being constantly slapped away as though it were some kind of radical anarchist revolution? Particularly when other democracies receive high scores for happier populations when they implement those policies as a baseline?
My sweet summer child, the US has never been a democracy. It's a "country" on stolen land. The "founders" we're genocidal, British Lords. They also owned Black people when they wrote the "Declaration of Independence." Independence for WEALTHY, WHITE MEN only. Not for women, not for POC, and not for poor, white people.
Dear me, how could I not know those things?? We've always been striving toward democracy, and that's a mighty goal. Don't knock it. The alternatives are wicked and deadly. We'd rather not go there.
You go ahead and bow out, full of grievance and dismissal, and I'll go on fighting for my country, flawed but worth keeping. Those are our choices.
You're a sheep. You want to be ruled over. I don't. Governments are bad, mmmkay. And you're saying the US is legitimate, it isn't. It's a British colonial settlement just like Israel.
LOL. I’ll bet you’ve got a plan to fix everything.
Any day now…
This is not about the legitimately of this government. It's about more attacks on those useless non-wealthy people that need to be cut loose from any help from the rest of this society.
I agree with a lot of this. As for guns I want guns regulated like cars also. I want to be able to carry my gun in all 50 states like I can drive in all 50 states, I want no restrictions on ammo capacity like no fuel capacity restrictions on cars, and I want no restrictions on caliber like there is no restriction on horsepower.
I haven’t finished reading your piece yet, but I’m so simultaneously enraged and excited by it that I can’t resist the urge to make a preliminary point: any and all ordinary Americans of Good Will can determine whether a pundit, analyst or politician is being authentic or bullshitting simply by identifying whether they equivocate on the meaning of “woke” and/or “the Left.”
These Neoliberal bullshitters always try to act like the Sanders/AoC wing of the party is totally out of touch by being “too woke,” when the fact of the matter is, the material/economic policies advocated by Sanders/AoC are overwhelmingly popular. It’s true (sadly) that many Americans are not (yet) on board with certain important issues of what has been called “social liberalism,” but to treat this discrepancy in popular sentiment and avowed ideology as if it exhaustively captures the views of self-described Leftists is a flat-out lie.
I’m so fucking sick of Klein, Thompson, et. al. I confess that I’m beginning to find it difficult not to hate them with a similar passion to my contempt for the MAGAts. Sigh. I’m a work in progress.
Bernie and AOC are the two most popular elected politicians in the country. It's Washington group think that their ideas are unreasonable or unpopular.
Any American of Good Will can determine that anyone throwing out terms like "neoliberal" is a fucking moron
This Abundance Movement makes me think it's the secular version of Prosperity Gospel, both, IMHO, looking for a slick way to cover the underlying, and baseless, claim that "them that have, deserve it, and them that don't, don't. Or maybe I'm missing something in making what might be a too fast conclusion?
That's a great observation.
Yes, that has always been one of the NeoLiberal talking points according to George Monbiot in his book on the ways the many NeoLiberal Think Tanks have converted the population and people of influence to their way.
In fact their are many ringing the warning bells about the "Abundance Movement". I just did a search with Ezra Klein and NeoLiberal as the two key words and got back many publications on the dangers of his and his cohorts selling of this movement... many.
This is just one of them.
[https://therevolvingdoorproject.org/abundance-agenda/
This is a snippet from the above publication.:
[Over the past few years, a cohort of neoliberal pundits from Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson to Matt Yglesias and Eric Levitz have increasingly problematized the modern regulatory state. They frame the government’s many environmental and labor standards as an impediment to “abundance.” Multiple books advancing this argument are slated to be published in the first months of 2025, from Marc Dunkelman’s Why Nothing Works to Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson.
“Supply-side liberals” take aim at the procedures that environmental and labor laws require the federal and state governments to follow as they assess the impacts of new infrastructure projects. They decry the tools that the left has wielded since the mid-twentieth century to hold government accountable when it fails to adequately do so. They frame the “need for speed” in the urgent terms of the energy transition. But they have tended to back legislative concessions to the fossil fuel industry and other corporate interests in the name of greater expediency.]
In my opinion, the Abundance Movement (if coming from the ideology in the Abundance book) isn’t about protecting those with capital and reinforcing low-redistribution systems, it’s about encouraging supply of housing, infrastructure, medicine, and innovation (in the form of effective research funding). The idea is to remove limitations of supply/improve efficiency of production that’s artificially hamstrung in order to lower costs for things: houses in the private market or public investment in infrastructure and R&D (lower cost in that the average person’s taxes goes back to them in greater public utility).
Thanks for this information. My impression came from the vibes coming off the name. It has that same feeling that appeals to the well-off, or those wanting to be in the upper circles. My bad.
No worries, I think that there is some misinformation/misrepresentation swirling around it.
> I’m sure the experts who ran Joe Biden in 2024 know better than I do!
Had to stop reading here. Couldn't be more factually incorrect than to lump Ezra Klein in with the people who supported running Joe Biden in 2024.
It was a reference to the Democratic politicians promoting the Abundance agenda.
What are you even talking about? Democratic politicians are the exact people Klein is criticizing. They’re overly focused on spending and well intentioned regulations rather than efficient and effective outcomes. LA’s homeless housing debacle spending billions on nothing, CA’s HSR delayed forever with insane costs, blue cities and states driving out working class families by exploding the cost of housing with arcane zoning restrictions.
Every time I click on one of these anti-Abundance articles it’s clear none of you have bothered to actually address Klein’s critiques. You just call him mean names and claim that Democrats would sweep to glorious power if only they embraced fantastical policies that have lost at the ballot box time and time again.
Democratic politicians ARE the Abundance Movement. Klein might criticize CA high speed rail, but Gavin Newsom is championing the Abundance Agenda as the next big thing. Again, I am criticizing the Movement, not the book.
Yeah that was a dead giveaway that the author is full of shit
You didn't miss much. He spends the article caricaturing Klein and Thompson without engaging in any substantive points they make.
We all know what's wrong with the Democrats. They don't listen to their constituents. Get out of DC, go buy groceries like an average American, shop at Walmart or Target and ask questions. Then STFU AND LISTEN. REALLY LISTEN.
Not a town hall. Not a letter writing campaign. An actual week or two on the streets of your district.
Then you can abundance the shit out of me.
They're so far from reality. It's incredible and shocking to watch.
We need professors, teachers, union members (auto, service industry, anything), scientists, people who needed SNAP and Medicaid, workers workers workers LABOR, to run for office. DNC pays for it. They pissed away $1 billion war chest and lost to a candidate that proved his inability to be president from 2017-2021. Consider this the “Robin Hood” strategy, taking from the rich to give to the poor. Money doesn’t take, it swears.
My congressional district, Nevada District 2, Congressman Mark E. Amodei (the worst kind of lap dog) ran last year with no Democratic opponent. There was an independent candidate. But NO DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE. Show up! Make noise. Raise a stink! SHOW THE FUCK UP!
There must be more than just my district where the incumbent is running unopposed. Take $150,000 and run a candidate. No flyers, no mailers, no advertising. $150k to get the message out on social media, on YouTube, in the local papers and on the local stations.
I’m so sick of this inability to have a message. It’s a malaise with Democrats. Entropy.
I come from a background where we marched, we knocked on doors, we did grassroots fundraising, we made coalitions, we canvassed. We didn’t rely on spin doctors, cable news networks, pundits, analysts, and polls. We relied on the sincerity and righteousness of our cause. We fought for justice.
MAGA and Trump call Democrats “the enemy.” START ACTING LIKE IT.
I reject the entire framing. There shouldn’t need to be a “choice” between, say, expediting permitting for new El tracks in Chicago and a robust social safety net. Or between next-Gen nuclear and a clean environment, for that matter. Maybe Dems should just be in favor of sh*t that makes sense and leave it at that?
I agree, and I think Klein would too. However, the real-life politicians claiming Abundance say we need to move to the right and get rid of those safety nets.
“Abundance say the opposite.” This is dead wrong. Getting rid of social safety nets? That is actually the complete opposite of what they say. Constantly. On literally every podcast and in just about every article. A person wouldbe hard-pressed to come up with a greater distortion of their actual positions. But I get it. Discourse of so much easier when you just lie about the people you disagree with
No they don't. Nobody is saying that. You're just making shit up.
Does Klein say that, at any point?
No, which is my point. I want Klein to clarify if he thinks the Abundance Movement, which IS dominated by voices trying to reduce social spending, should be the Democrats' national answer. Again, I'm not criticizing what Klein wrote in the book. I'm criticizing what came after it, and asking him to state what he thinks about it.
I’m sorry, but it sounds like a cult to me. I don’t want anything to do with it! I prefer the vision of Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. It’s the word “abundance.” Gives me the heebie jeebies. Don’t want anything to do with it.
I used to listen to Ezra Klein on Vox. Eventually I got tired of the verbosity. If Ezra can use ten multi syllable words to describe something that could otherwise be described in five short syllables, he will. His tone of voice is so soft it’s almost a somnambulant. Puts me right under. Listening to him is like watching a beehive. Lots of buzzing, but no honey.
'Listening to him is like watching a beehive. Lots of buzzing, but no honey.'
OMG, that's a perfect analogy!
So you have never listened to him. In fact, there is lots of "honey" in his essays.
Physician, heal thyself!
I have listened to him many times. That was kind of the point to what I said! Puts me to sleep. I’m sure he’s a very nice fellow, but I can’t keep my attention on what he’s saying over the long haul. And my point had more to do with the idea of “abundance,” which had always had a negative connotation to me. I think because there’s a branch of evangelical Christianity that follows an “abundance” philosophy, which allows them to become very rich and ignore the poverty all around them. “Jesus doesn’t really hate the money changers in the temple; he wants everyone to share in the abundance of material goods,” which is not what Jesus’ own words say in the Bible. So talking about abundance has those echoes for me. It’s code for being selfish and that being okay.
But maybe I misjudge Ezra Klein?
I don't care if you dislike Klein. I do care if fighting Trump is not your priority.
Trump threatens to turn our country into a dictatorship. We need a big tent resistance, with the only membership rule being willingness to fight Trump.
If we beat Trump, then we can go back to arguing about the size of the economic safety net, flag burning, racial quotas, etc.
I know the US has always been a flawed democracy. But life would be safer if we were straight up fascist.
Fight Vance, fight Trump, not Klein
Why are those mutually exclusive?
See below
Fighting Klein helps Trump and weakens democracy in the US. If you think those are good things, we are not friends
This is a child's understanding of politics.
One can't be a lifelong 'Centrist' Democract. The center has been moving steadily to the Right,v pegging nearly far right in these days. Possible to say life long 'Conservative' Democract.
If you fight Trump, I don't care what you think about Klein, even though I disagree about Klein
I cannot stand Donald Trump. I wish he would die, right now. I don’t even dislike Klein. I just find him long-winded. But I have ADHD and listening to some people is difficult for me.
I appreciate this perspective. I have just started reading Abundance, after hearing a compelling talk with the authors and Michael Pollan on the Long Now podcast. That venue, by design, takes a longer view. It’s worth a listen.
“My theory is that Ezra Klein knows Abundance was never meant to be what it became.” I think this is an important point that is getting lost in the larger discussion. Why are we giving so much agency to the authors over how the Dems respond? The Democratic Party does not have an Ezra Klein problem. It has a zero unified vision problem. If they glom onto this idea and rebrand it because it is neatly packaged for them, merits aside, that just shows a general lack of creativity and leadership on the party’s part that they need to wait for a policy reporter to coin their platform for them. We know that the party is divided. No one is getting the job done of unifying -- AOC/Bernie or the center-lefties. And that has shot them in the foot. I don’t think it’s necessary, or even causal, to pin that on two reporters who have some decent ideas about getting the country unstuck. Maybe this shouldn’t be a partisan concept? That would be the dream. I think the book speaks to that possibility.
Also, I do not have the knowledge of union politics that you clearly do. But as a 30 year Coloradan, Polis is not a panacea governor. No one politician can be. Just as no one book can solve all the problems, no matter how compelling. Polis has done some good things, and some shifty things. That is disappointing about the unions. But I don’t think we can give the Abundance movement that much credit. It is conceptually new. Naming things retroactively seems unwise.
What I am interested in is whether the salient points in the book have legs, party bastardization aside. We need more housing now, we need flourishing cities and rural areas now, we need clean energy now. Our main problem is dickering over nuance in getting any of that done. Thanks for the thoughts.
Thanks for reading! I agree with what you say about Polis. He's certainly not Abundance-only. I used that example to point out that the Movement (mostly centrist, already-elected Democrats) has no interest in the 'left Abundance' Klein talks about in his book. So when he says that in interviews, he's talking about an imaginary option, not what Abundance has become.
It’s interesting to me how the “abundance” tribe and the “anti-abundance” tribe, when they fight, completely talk past each other. The Seder-Klein debate was a really good example of this. Each side seems to have came away from it thinking their guy so completely trounced the other. Those inclined to support Klein thought that Seder was completely non-rigorous, unable to deal in anything except generalities. Joe seemed to sum up the opposite position well, the idea that Klein’s points were sleight of hand to distract from the big questions.
People are talking about completely different things, and seem confused by this because each side wants to fight on the ground they want to fight on. There seems to be some general disbelief in the conversation that the other side genuinely cares about the things they say they care about.
I agree, but I think Klein was changing the conversation on purpose, for the reasons I stated. Seder would ask him a question about national-level politics, which is valid given the Abundance Movement, and Klein would change the conversation to a specific issue. It was disingenuous.
I greatly respect the views of Pollan (the Omnivore's Dilemma) as well as Klein (everything I have read or heard by him)
Total joke of an article. The origins of abundance politics lie not in elite hands, but in planning commission and city council meetings.
Detached from what actually matters in favor of upping points for your preferred team on an imaginary scorecard—without realizing that there is nothing in abundance politics that prevents its combination with anti-monopolism. In fact, the two are well-suited together and prominent abundance folks frequently call for their combination.
When you say Abundance, do you mean the movement or the book? I agree that the book could take an anti-monopolist flavor. But the Movement has shown no interest in doing that.
Abundance "the movement" precedes the book, but is named by it (for popular political purposes). And yes, many urbanists, solar developers, and popular movement builders that support them are anti-monopolists as well. Again, they have been before any attempt at popularly naming them was made.
In fact, the anti-monopoly forwarded by popular Democrats is weak. It pretends to be all encompassing, but it focuses almost completely on corporate concentration of power. If you are serious, you have to also consider small-p private, nonprofit, and public sector concentrations of power. Academic Neo-brandeisism is concerned with all of these things, but in political practice it has expressed itself to the incredibly limited view of corporate and oligarchical criticism. For example, there is an astonishing moment in Klein's recent interview with Zephyr Teachout where she answers that housing is probably so expensive to build because of corporate concentration--I am in the process right now of entering real estate development, and this is simply not the case. Housing construction remains a startingly local and small-business job. The high costs come primarily from building codes and arbitrary aesthetic and historically "moral" restrictions that cities place first on the developers that build a home, and then on the people and businesses that would occupy it.
So, where you may say abundance the movement fails to address the concerns of anti-monopoly, even if it may theoretically account for them, I feel just as well happy saying this of anti-monopoly about the concerns of abundance. I will extend this further to say that I do not believe anti-monopoly will be a winning strategy, and neither will abundance. They are similarly motivated theoretical framings interested in mostly distinct policy mechanics that motivate different groups of voters to address different concerns. Both are useful and necessary, but neither is on its own a popular political movement capable of electing a president, or more importantly, an efficacious Congress.
In the end, I have no issue with anti-monopoly, but I do take issue with the incessant blog-style pieces taking misinformed and disingenuous pot-shots at abundance. If you see no theoretical issue between the two, write that. What you have here will not help build any coalition, and it certainly does not help in restoring truth and decency to public discourse.
Cut the flow of dark money into politics and that alone will solve one third of the problems and corruption in government. Tax at 75% and remove subsidies (welfare) for corporations, agribusiness, churches and billionaires and we’ve solve another third of the problem in government. Lastly, reform the constitution to include the lessons we’ve learned in the past 250 years. This country will not be of the people, by the people and for the people until the people take it over and run it.
I really see no reason why the Bernie/AOC economic justice agenda and the Abundance agenda couldn't be combined into a robust platform that addresses a wide range of concerns and builds a broad coalition. The main reason it can't is due to the fact that the oligarchs are trying to use abundance as an alternative to economic justice instead of a supplement.
It also doesn't help that abundance is being interpreted as deregulation, rather than a holistic rethinking of how various regulations interplay in the market and how they could be streamlined without sacrificing their goals. I thought the book was clear that it was not proposing another "throw the baby out with the bathwater" approach to deregulation that we usually see.
If you pair abundance with universal health care, you can counter the whole "tax and spend liberal" characterization while still pushing for important new programs. I'm fully annoyed that the power brokers are turning this into a false dichotomy instead of a winning partnership.
You're hitting on another divide between how Klein talks, saying there's a 'left abundance,' and the Abundance Movement which is actively fighting the left. It's another reason I'd like him to clarify his thoughts on the larger project.
Wait, so lowering the cost of living doesn’t uplift people?
Of course it does! But Abundance alone can't lower it enough.
So lowering rent and electricity costs isn’t enough?
You're being disingenuous. What Klein is proposing won't lower rent and electricity to the point Americans are comfortable with. On energy, we need to remove the profit motive. Power lines are centrally planned by the government but run by private companies. They charge more to make a profit. Eliminating that will drastically lower costs.
On energy, environmental laws need to be redone so that any utility, public or private, can build the transmission lines needed to decarbonize. On energy, laws need to change so that a utility, public or private, has an easier time building more power plants.
On housing, rent is cheaper in Texas than it is in Washington. I would love to hear you explain how people are more motivated by profit in the Pacific Northwest than they are in Texas.
That white suburban mom that actually likes Liz Cheney does *not* want zoning reform. So who TF are they trying to attract? Get back the tech bros? Maybe, they are turning on Trump now. But most people, across demographics are done with billionaire rule, so who has better messaging?
You're right. It keeps capital friendly to Democrats, which is a big reason Newsom, Yglesias, and more love it.
You wrote that the left-of-center divide is between those inclined to capital and those inclined to labor. If that's true, then it's sure weird that when you look at the actual issues the left position is often closer to the preferences of the top-half than to the policies working class voters prefer.
For example, Joe is upset that Colorado Governor Jared Polis vetoed a bill that would have streamlined workplace unionization, because “unions are proven to help raise wages, and Polis is beholden to his anti-union corporate donors.” Maybe. Or, it could be that unions are a lot more popular among the left than they are among working class voters. Just 9.9% of U.S. workers belong to a labor union. Maybe Polis realizes that the Democratic Party has lost and must win back working voters, who don’t see shrinking labor unions as a big problem for the economy or their economic well-being. Nor do they place labor unions near the top of what’s most likely to help working people get ahead. https://www.progressivepolicy.org/campaign-for-working-america-a-ppi-yougov-survey-of-working-class-voters/ https://www.thirdway.org/report/renewing-the-democratic-party
So few workers belong to unions because of corporate-controlled politicians like Polis. I'm hesitant to trust a source that calls itself 'radically pragmatic,' so let's use Gallup. According to them, labor unions are at a 70% approval rating. https://x.com/Gallup/status/1828793176754409957
Also, I'm a labor organizer, and unions are popular no matter the workers' political affiliation. I've certainly organized more rural Trump voters than urban progressives.
"Actually the working class hates unions [posts thirdway.org link]"
Is this a parody account
Thank you. I was given a ticket to his book tour - and was baffled by why anyone would take him seriously. Ezra - and all the upper class liberals who find him mesmerizing simply live in a self-imposed cocoon. They have to take great pains not to see or feel the suffering around them - much less take account of their
roles in perpetuating it. Shameful.
Sounds just like the abundance gospel to me. (IOW, just another fancy way to justify one’s own greed, at someone else’s expense.)